Garlic (Alliums sativum) is the second most widely grown bulb after onion. Garlic is a well-known spice used in many Asian, African and European countries. Its significant chemical composition makes it medically important as garlic exhibited antimicrobial, antioxidant, anticarcenogenic, antidiabetic activities. Microbial spoilage of garlic proved the chief cause of postharvest losses every year. In the present study, Allium sativum was subjected to gamma irradiation to lessen the surface microbial load, hence prolonging the storage life.The garlic samples were irradiated at different doses of...

Cucumbers (Cucumis sativus L.) belongs to the family of cucurbitaceae. It is an economically important vegetable crop cultivated in over 80 countries with more than 66 million production annually. The current study involves the use of gamma radiation to enhance the shelf life of cucumber. For this purpose, cucumber sample was subjected to Co-60 gamma irradiation at different doses 1, 1.5 and 2 kGy. Microbial and sensory analysis was carried out for all the treatments. Irradiation dose of 1.5 kGy was found to be the most effective dose at which both microbiological and sensory attributes...

Onion (Allium cepa L.) is one of the most widely grown vegetable in Pakistan and a means to earn valuable foreign exchange for the country. Microbial spoilage of onion is a major cause resulting in post harvest loss every year. In the present study, gamma radiation treatment was used to reduce the pathogenic microflora of Allium cepa L. hence increasing post harvest storage life. The major exported onion variety of Punjab (Desi Red) was selected for the study. The onion bulbs were irradiated at the doses of 0.05, 0.10 and 0.15 kGy at PARAS Foods, Lahore. Then the comparison of microbial...

The current study was carried out to investigate the effects of gamma irradiation on the epiphytic microflora and ripening process of the green Dwarf Cavendish bananas harvested at three-quarter stage of the maturity. The mature green bananas were irradiated using Cobalt-60 as the source at different dosages of 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0 kGy. The mean life of both the experimental and control group of fruits was analyzed under ambient conditions. For all the treatments the microbial potential, the decay percent and the ripening behavior of the fruits were recorded. Results revealed that the applied...

Delivery kits are the simple and disposable kits that help to achieve safe delivery of babies. The birthing kit comprises of different disposable instruments. These disposable instruments may have a huge microbial load on them which can be very dangerous for the neonate as well as for the mother. So, sterilization is indeed a prerequisite for birth procedures using these kits. But what type of microbial load is present? What are the health effects of that bio burden? What type of sterilization should be done? What are the effects of that sterilization procedure are the important points to...

The botanical name of figs is Ficus carica. Figs have become economically important throughout the world as an agricultural product Food Irradiation Technology is used to save dried fruits from insect infestation and also increase their shelf life. Keeping in view the significance of gamma radiation to kill micro-flora the present study was designed to enhance the shelf life of figs. The nutritional value was also evaluated the by proximate analysis after exposure to gamma radiation.

Spices are any form of vegetable stuff used to give aroma, delicious taste and color to food.Ginger is herbaceous perennial plant, and has important applications both in food and medical industry. Food irradiation is very useful as it produces desire food preservative effects. Keeping in view the importance of ginger present study was designed to optimize dose of gamma radiation for ginger to reduce its post harvest losses without affecting its nutritional value.The present work also focused on the analysis of nutritional value of ginger after gamma radiation treatment.

Current research is intended towards the use of low doses Cobalt 60 gamma irradiation not only for extending the shelf life of dried figs but to reduce the extent of fatal clinical outbreaks associated with consumption of contaminated dried figs. Ultimately post harvest losses due to multi-stage processing of fruit will be also reduced. For this purpose two low doses i.e. 0.25 and 0.5 kGy were selected in order to achieve targeted goals. Selected doses were optimum for maintenance of sensory attributes and controlling infestation. The study resulted in conclusion that for reducing the overall...

Cannula is a medical device usually used in hospitals for introducing medicine or draining off fluid from the body. It should be highly sterilized prior to use. Several methods of sterilization are being used for the elimination of microflora from medical devices including cannula. There have been reported many cases of life threatening diseases associated to unsterilization, some of which can have serious consequences. Bearing in mind the complications of unsterilized cannula, commercially available cannulae were collected to determine the bioburden on them. After the identification of...